- Jerry Boylan, the captain of the scuba dive boat that killed 34 people in a fire off the coast of California in 2019, has been sentenced to four years in prison.
- Boylan was convicted of one count of ship officer misconduct or neglect, a pre-Civil War statute designed to hold captains and crew criminally responsible for maritime disasters.
- “Mr. Boylan continues to live with significant grief, remorse and trauma as a result of the deaths of his passengers and crew,” his lawyers wrote in a sentencing memorandum.
A federal judge on Thursday sentenced the captain of a scuba dive boat to four years in custody and three years of supervised release for criminal negligence, after a fire aboard the ship killed 34 people.
The September 2, 2019 fire was the deadliest maritime disaster in recent U.S. history, and prompted changes in maritime regulations, congressional reform, and several ongoing lawsuits.
Capt. Jerry Boylan was found guilty last year of one count of misconduct or neglect involving a ship’s officer. The charge is a pre-Civil War statute known colloquially as murder of a sailor. It was designed to hold steamboat captains and crew responsible for maritime disasters.
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Boylan’s appeal continues. He had to stay behind bars for 10 years.
The defense had asked the judge to sentence Boylan to five years of probation and three years of house arrest.
“Although the loss of life here is staggering, there can be no dispute that Mr. Boylan did not intend for anyone to die,” his lawyers wrote in a sentencing memorandum. “Indeed, Mr. Boylan is living with significant grief, remorse and trauma as a result of the deaths of his passengers and crew.”
Conception was anchored 25 miles south of Santa Cruz Island. Santa BarbaraWhen it caught fire before dawn on the last day of the three-day excursion, it sank less than 100 feet from shore.
Thirty-three passengers and one crew member died, trapped in a bunkroom below deck. The dead included a deckhand who had landed his dream job; An environmental scientist who conducted research in Antarctica; A couple traveling around the world; a Singaporean data scientist; and a family of three sisters, their father and his wife.
Boylan was the first to leave the ship and jump into the water. The four crew members accompanying him also survived.
FILE – In this photo provided by the Ventura County Fire Department, VCFD firefighters respond to a fire aboard the Conception dive boat in the Santa Barbara Channel off the coast of Southern California on Sept. 2, 2019. A scuba dive boat captain is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday, May 2, 2024, by a federal judge after pleading guilty to criminal negligence after a ship fire that killed 34 people nearly five years ago. (Ventura County Fire Department via AP, file)
Thursday’s sentencing was the final step in a grueling prosecution that lasted nearly five years and that repeatedly disappointed the victims’ families.
A grand jury in 2020 initially indicted Boylan on 34 counts of Seaman’s murder, meaning he could have faced a total of 340 years behind bars. Boylan’s lawyers argued that the deaths were the result of a single incident and not separate crimes, so prosecutors got a superseding indictment charging Boylan with only one count.
In 2022, US District Judge George Wu The superseding case was dismissed, saying it failed to specify that Boylan acted with gross negligence. Prosecutors were forced to go before the grand jury again.
Although the exact cause of the Conception fire is still unknown, prosecutors and the defense tried to apportion blame during a 10-day trial last year.
The government said Boylan failed to deploy required night watches and never properly trained his crew in firefighting. The lack of a roving watch meant that the fire was able to spread throughout the 75-foot-long boat without detection.
But Boylan’s lawyers tried to pin the blame on Glenn Fritzler, who with his wife owns Truth Aquatics Inc., which frequently operates Conception and two other scuba dive boats around the Channel Islands. He argued that Fritzler was responsible for failing to train the crew in fire fighting and other safety measures, as well as creating a lax seafaring culture, which he called “the Fritzler way”, in which anyone working for him Also the captain had not posted the revolving watch.
Fritzler has not spoken publicly about the tragedy since an interview with a local TV station a few days after the fire. His lawyers never responded to requests for comment. The Associated Press,
With the conclusion of the criminal case, attention now turns to the many ongoing trials.
Three days after the fire, Truth Aquatics filed suit under a pre-Civil War provision of maritime law that allows it to limit its liability to the value of the remains of the boat, which was a total loss. The time-tested legal maneuver has been successfully employed by owners of the Titanic and other ships, and Fritzler needed to show that he was not at fault.
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That case is pending, along with other cases filed by victims’ families against the Coast Guard, alleging negligence in enforcing the roving watch requirement.
